In determining an individual's financial well-being, income and expenditures are the two primary variables. In general, a person who spends less than s/he makes has better financial health than one who does not. If a person's expenses are higher than their income, a person can take the appropriate action. In order to improve their financial health, they should either reduce expenses or increase their income. Over time, inaction only worsens their financial health. The use of credit cards or other forms of credit can further exacerbate this issue. Such forms of credit may be viewed as teaching a practice of making payments on everything a consumer wishes to purchase. Large late fees, variable interest rates, late charges, overdraft fees, and other fees make such practices difficult to maintain. As a result, many people have difficulty managing their money.
Various conventional products exist to aid consumers in managing their financial well-being. For example, there are existing books publications and articles on budgeting and how to save money. Many of these tools describe tracking and keeping notes on where an individual spends their money. Other conventional products store financial information for a user and allow the user to view some portion of the information. For example, a user's accounts with a particular bank may be linked. The bank automatically stores a record of the account activity. Through the Internet, the user may use their home computer to view the activity over a specified time period. Suppose a user has a checking account, a stored value, or debit, card, and a credit card with a particular bank. Using such a conventional product, deposits, withdrawals, point-of-sale (POS) transactions or other purchases associated with the debit card, and/or credit card transactions over a particular time period may be stored and viewed by the user. Some conventional products also categorize at least some of the account activity. For example, a user may be allowed to view the total amount of charitable contributions, purchases for gas, purchases for airlines/travel or other similar financial transactions for the time period.
Although such conventional products provide an opportunity for a user to improve management of their finances, they are often ineffective. As can be seen by statistics such as the low savings rate in the United States, many consumers remain unable to maintain financial well-being. People are busy and don't have time to keep track of every expense or payment. For this and other reasons, many of these products are not sufficiently helpful in allowing individuals to manage their finances.